The New School Looks To Find Home For Their Occupiers

Monday November 28^th, students and faculty attended a University wide Town Meeting at 2 West 13^th Street, aimed address a case of vandalism that had occurred in that specific room on Saturday by a select few of a group of occupiers who had moved from their original location at the Student Study Center on 90 5^th Avenue. The Student Senate who aimed to have, what Co-chair Melissa Holmes referred to as, “an informal town hall” monitored the meeting. Holmes added, “the meeting aims to look at how we are going to move forward, not only in terms of this space, but in terms of this community,” the meeting would decide if the students would be allowed to occupy the space, or any space in the school.

The meeting revolved around a queue of speakers from the audience. Many feared that the occupation was out of control. “They are writing demands that don’t make any sense,” student and worker, Adam Rodriguez said of the graffiti. Of the atmosphere within the occupation, one speaker referred the aggressive atmosphere within the occupation as being a “psychological pepper spray.” However, many agreed that The New School hosting an occupation was in accordance with The New School’s relationship to political activism. Occupier and Masters student, Ted, called the occupation a “revitalization of politics.”

Through a jungle of complaints and comments, a theme arose to support the occupation, though not in the Kellen Gallery. The Kellen Gallery is a semi-public ‘state-of-the-art gallery’ used for school events and art exhibits. The occupation would force the curator and people in charge of the space to reorganize their events.

The end of the two-hour meeting did not find a decision and the room had emptied to a group that could not represent a majority. A couple of forms of voting were proposed, one to create a class where voters would sign up, another was in email form. The Student Senate promised to email the student body an update as to where the occupation would go and how the final decision would be carried out.